


The Thrill Is Strong But Not So Sweet

by theweddingofthefoxes



Category: Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Background Anne/Dan - Freeform, Masturbation, Other, Sexy Food, Symbiote Sex, animal cruelty, sexy chocolate, symbiote shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-13
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2020-03-02 17:56:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,415
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18816055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theweddingofthefoxes/pseuds/theweddingofthefoxes
Summary: Eddie is always looking for a story that people need to know about, even if it's a story that could cost him his health or life -- like an investigation about illegal tiger breeding. But there are sweeter things in life than breaking those stories, as Venom is happy to remind him.





	The Thrill Is Strong But Not So Sweet

“This is going to be a good story,” Eddie promised, as he always did.

Venom was a tougher critic than most, of course. Getting it to understand _why_ the story would be good was always challenging, especially because any earthly sense of justice seemed needlessly complex to it. It wasn’t that the symbiote didn’t understand in an intellectual way, it’s just that to Venom, the whole concept was….

_Stupid. A human that cheats other humans that it was tasked with protecting or helping should simply be destroyed._

“I mean, I’m not arguing with you on that,” Eddie responded. They were standing at the bathroom mirror, attempting to do more than the bare minimum with Eddie’s hair before heading out to speak to a contact. “But our idea of justice just isn’t how things work here.”

_The rules of this world are so very arbitrary. Those who harm and destroy are above being harmed and destroyed?_

“Not in San Quentin, they’re not. At least not when gen pop gets word of it. We just gotta get ‘em there first.”

_Or devour them._

“Maybe we should run for president, huh?” Eddie laughed at that. “I think maybe more than a few people would agree with your campaign platform of eating rapists and snake oil salesmen. Hell, I’d vote for you.”

_We are one, Eddie. We cannot vote for ourselves. It is against the rules._

“See, look, you’re figuring out our moral system already.” He glanced in the mirror one more time, patted his own cheek. “That’s as good as it’s gonna get, I think. Let’s go talk to that contact.” 

The contact in question was meeting them at a hole-in-the-wall sort of cafe, a place that seemed shabby on purpose. Not really Eddie’s cup of tea, figuratively or literally. In its effort to stand at the opposite end of the spectrum from Starbucks, the cafe had tried way, way too hard to seem bohemian and homey, and it ended up just being kind of embarassing instead. All of the knicknacks had all been purchased from TJ Maxx and none of its art, Eddie was quick to note, had been created by local artists. The food and drinks that were being offered didn’t help his opinion of the place much. Eddie rolled his eyes at the menu, which offered creations like “Mind Detoxer” and “Chakra Shakes”. 

“Just a black coffee, please,” he told the cashier. At least this place couldn’t fuck that up, though Eddie liked to add a whole handful of sugar packets to his order to get it to some wholly mysterious level of sweetness that only he could discern and approve of. When he went to grab some, he spotted a brightly-patterned sign taped to what appeared to be a cookie jar, though there were no cookies within, just recycled paper napkins.

_We’re excited to be your new neighbors!_ the sign read. _We’re Anderson & Lee Chocolatiers, and we’re a local chocolate company that believes in the real things -- friendship, community, and adding something sweet to everyone’s day. And we don’t just talk the talk! Instead of bringing our new neighbors casseroles, we’ve got something even better: the chance to win a lot of free chocolate. (And we do mean a lot.) It’s easy! All you need to do is put your business card in the jar, and you could be our lucky prize winner. We’ll be doing our drawing here at Calm Mind Cafe on Saturday, 6/3, but if you can’t make it, we’ll be sure to give you a call. And don’t forget to visit our new store to pick up a few treats if you don’t end up winning -- we can hook you up with some great deals…_

Eddie chuckled to himself as he grabbed his sugar. The question was sure to come any second now...

_What is paper this for?_ Venom wanted to know. 

Called it. Reliable as clockwork. “It’s a raffle,” he said. Ever since Anne had let him borrow her old Bluetooth earpiece, nobody ever looked at him when he seemed to be talking to himself. Looking like the poster boy for San Francisco douchebag was a small price to pay to be able to chat freely with Venom when they were in public. “Some new store in this neighborhood’s giving away free chocolate.”

_Giving it away? Why would they do that?_

“Just for one person, see? Everybody tries to be the winner, but only one person can be.” This was the sort of thing Venom understood naturally. 

_So you must destroy the others in order to get all of the chocolate for yourself._

“Not quite how it works. It’s just luck, you know? Arbitrary, like you said. There’s no way of knowing who gets it. It’s just chance.”

The symbiote gave a sort of hum-purr of comprehension. 

“Anyway. Why not give it a shot?”

_Yes! Give them a card._ Venom sounded downright thrilled, and really, there was nothing that Eddie liked better than that. It took a minute for Eddie to find any of his business cards in his wallet, but he finally found one, squished between his medical marijuana card and a coupon for a free 6-inch Subway sandwich. 

“Okay. Wish us luck.”

_Yes. We will wish for luck,_ Venom agreed. 

Eddie jiggled his leg once they sat down, scrolled through Twitter without actually really looking at any of the posts, adjusted the Bluetooth earpiece, twisted the bracelets around his wrist like he was trying to open some giant combination lock. _Your contact is late_ , Venom complained. _We are hungry. Buy something from this place._

“No. Not doing that. I don’t want any of this stupid shit.”

_But we are hungry._ When they’d first come together, before they really knew and understood each other -- before, he’d daresay, they loved each other -- Venom’s demands had been downright frightening; now, it was a lot more like dealing with a cranky toddler. The symbiote was easy to irritate, but just as easy to soothe. In that way, it was just like its host, who was feeling grumbly and stubborn about purchasing any food that he probably wouldn’t even like anyway. Eddie would have to make a note of where that new fancy-pants chocolate spot was. Maybe he’d get Venom a treat sometime soon, to thank him for putting up with such a long wait and with Eddie’s own sour mood.

By the time the contact had finally arrived, Eddie’s coffee was more than half-drunk and they were full of a caffeinated restlessness, sitting at a table and peering out the window at the street beyond, shifting position every three seconds and never quite able to get comfortable. The hard, narrow chair made Eddie feel like his ass was being fitted into a meat loaf tin. 

“I’m so sorry I’m behind,” a voice called, and Eddie set his phone down so he could see the speaker properly. She was a woman right around his age, the same sort of wannabe-hippie as the people that worked here. Flowing, toe-length paisley dress, but a Tiffany bracelet that probably cost as much as a laptop. That kind of thing. Still, she seemed earnest, happy to talk to him. If what she had hinted at was true, then it would be, as he’d promised before he and Venom had set out that day, a good story. “Traffic, you know…”

“It always is, believe me.” Eddie leaned forward to shake her hand. “It’s Suzanne, right?”

“You can call me Suz.” She sat down across from him, her bracelet jangling as it brushed against the table. 

“Okay, Suz, good to see you.” Eddie smiled as he withdrew his notepad and a pencil from his rucksack. “So you said you’ve got something to tell me about tigers. How about you start from the beginning? Where did you find out about this?”

“The guy’s my neighbor. In a manner of speaking. We live way outside the city, not that close to one another, but I live closer than anybody else. Our properties bump up against each other.”

“Mmhm.” Eddie scribbled a few things down. The property that she had indicated where she and this guy lived was not cheap real estate, even though it was in the middle of nowhere. 

“I’d always been of the understanding that he bred dogs. Not show dogs, but, you know. Hunting dogs, or police dogs, that kind of thing. The kind that could rip somebody apart. That’s why he needed so much space, and why he was so aggressive about keeping other people away from his property. He told me that the dogs were bred to be aggressive and that they could hurt people or animals who showed up uninvited.”

“But of course that’s not really the case.”

“I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a single dog since I moved in about two years ago. But I’ve got plenty of evidence of tigers.”

Which she had emailed to him. Pictures, videos. That was why Eddie had agreed to come to this cafe in the first place and talk to her. _Illegal tiger breeding and selling? Oh hell yes._

“So if your neighbor is taking all of these precautions, how is it that you got the footage?” Eddie wanted to know, poking his cheek with the eraser end of the pencil.

“You’ve gotta understand, this isn’t one of those Hollywood crime syndicates,” Suz told him. “We’re not talking slick smugglers, this is a one-man operation, as far as I’ve been able to tell. I’ve seen him walking around with people, almost like he’s touring them, showing them what they could get, and then those people leaving with dog kennels. But like I’ve said, I’ve never seen a single dog on the property. But I _have_ seen tigers, because sometimes they escape from wherever he’s got them. Then he either catches them or _shoots_ them. To kill.”

Suz hadn’t brought any of that stuff up in their initial contact, but now it seemed like this was definitely too important of a story to pass up. Eddie sat up a little straighter, and he could feel the prickle deep in the back of his head of Venom paying closer attention as well. “Wait, so he’ll kill his own tigers?”

“I guess he already has those that he can breed, and it’s better for him in the long run to kill one that could get away and blow the lid off the entire thing.” Suz sighed. “That’s why I want this kind of thing reported on by someone like you, Mr. Brock. Who knows how many animals he’s got on his property for this kind of thing? Or how many breeder contacts he has?” There were tears in her eyes, real tears, and Eddie felt himself soften towards her. Whatever judgements he had made, it was clear that she wanted to help the animals, that she was terrified that more of them would die at this person’s hands. “And suppose I call the police first, they don’t know how to handle the animals and the tigers end up getting killed? It’s not _their_ fault that they’re there.” 

Eddie nodded. “No, I agree. I am am definitely going to look into this.”

Suz lowered her voice a bit, though it didn’t seem as though anybody here at this cafe was really paying attention to them in the first place. “I understand that your reporting methods are somewhat...unorthodox.”

Within, Eddie could feel Venom give some kind of sound that could best be translated as a snicker. 

“You are one hundred percent right about that,” Eddie answered, trying to stifle a laugh. He cleared his throat, continued. “I mean, I’m here for the truth. In whatever form that it might take. And through any means that might require, you know?” She looked assured already, and he continued. “I can tell you really care about these animals, just from talking to you. I’m glad you told me about this.” 

“So can you find out what’s going on?”

“Me? Of course I can.” Eddie stretched back against the seat. “I’ve got networks like you wouldn’t believe. This tiger guy is as good as busted.”

By the time Eddie was back out on the street, he could feel Venom boiling around within him, and it was hard to tell which of them was more excited to take on this new story. _I do not know a_ tiger _, Eddie. But your understanding of it is full of awe._

“Here, let’s look at one,” Eddie said, and they found a bench to settle on as Eddie pulled up YouTube on his phone. Venom was so excited that they had to take a moment to breathe, pause the footage of a tiger in the wild pouncing on some unexpecting deer, lest Venom decide to take him over and wreak havoc all over the city just because it was so jazzed by the concept of a tiger.

_It is a predator! Claws and teeth!_

“Hell yeah it is.” Eddie grinned. “We’ll get to see some when we head out there tomorrow.”

_Such a creature would make an excellent host._

“Hey, now,” Eddie mock-scolded. “You aren’t leaving me for some _cat_ , are you?”

The symbiote shifted inside of him, the feeling radiating from it half-stubborn, half-apologetic. When it did this, it often felt like getting a good stretch, the sort of warm and comforting feeling in Eddie’s muscles, but without having to move at all. _You are a better source of resources_ , it admitted after a moment, and Eddie had to laugh.

“Yeah, okay. Love you too.”

* * *

Since Venom had first come into Eddie’s life, his relationship with Anne had settled into something both totally new and oddly familiar. Maybe they didn’t fuck anymore, or live together anymore, or talk about a future _together_ anymore, but it felt good to meet up regularly and talk about their lives, bizarre as those lives had become now that Venom was in the picture. Eddie distinctly felt that, were his life at stake in a way that Venom couldn’t somehow assist with, Anne would go to great lengths to save it, but she also seemed to relish teasing him about swearing off human relationships and going right for the alien. (Venom had to be calmed a bit after the first time she did that, thinking she was threatening them in some way, but when Eddie explained the joke, it seemed to take an inordinate amount of pride in it, and it never missed an opportunity to remind Eddie that it knew him in a way she never could.)

“No more coffee today”, Eddie had said when they’d made the plans to get together that day. “That’s my only stipulation.” So Anne chose a little Chinese restaurant not that far from where Eddie lived now, a place she liked because they kept turtles in an enormous tank that diners could watch while they waited for their food. It was getting warm, and Eddie pulled off his jacket, draped it around the back of the chair.

“So you planning to bail me out of this if I get slapped with trespassing?”

“You’ve had more trespassing violations than I’ve had hot meals, Eddie,” she answered, rolling her eyes. “If you’re in a patch of land where you’re legally permitted to be, it’s a miracle.”

“Hey, stories don’t happen in those patches.”

“They do if you become a food reporter. Now that’s a job I’d like to see you do.”

“Because there are lower odds of me getting shot in the head while I’m sneaking onto someone’s property to potentially get eaten by God knows how many tigers?”

“That does help. But I also really do think you’d be good at it.” She poured out some more green tea into her cup in its delicate saucer. “Both of you.”

“I don’t trust this one to write my stories.” A tendril of darkness emerged from under the table like a dog’s snout, and Eddie placed his hand at the table’s edge so Venom could butt into it, annoyed but without any real annoyance. “Maybe a hundred symbiotes typing at a hundred computers for a hundred years, we’d get something.”

“But think of all of the restaurants you could eat at and never get full,” Anne argued, laughing. “Your buddy’s like a little garbage disposal.”

“It’s not exactly, uh, noble, is it? To just go and eat at swanky restaurants all the time instead of trying to raise awareness to things that actually matter?”

_Eddie! You are being incredibly stupid. Think of all of the things we could eat! It would be your job, and they would have to give all of the food to us._

Eddie grinned. “You’ve done it, you realize that? You got Venom going now,” he said. “Now I’ll never hear the end of it.”

“All I’m saying is, use your head for a minute.” She took a sip of her tea. “I wouldn’t dream of asking you to consider going to those places where a plate of three spinach leaves costs thirty dollars.”

“Aka that kind of place where you meet all of your lawyer friends for drinks.”

“That’s my business,” Anne said, pulling a face that Eddie knew all too well. “But think about people with amazing places that they’re desperate to get the word out about. Immigrants, felons, people getting back on their feet, people who don’t have huge budgets to advertise but who are pouring their soul into these places, people who don’t know if they’re going to be able to make this dream live another month. Then imagine the city’s most well-known reporter, by a _mile_ , and that’s not flattery, so you can wipe that smirk off your face. It’s just the numbers. So imagine you come in and write a story about their restaurant….you could change their lives, Eddie.”

Hiding the smirk wasn’t going so well, but deeper down, Eddie felt genuinely touched by how passionately Anne was saying all of this. Clearly, she had been imagining something like this for him for some time now, and now she was seizing the opportunity to actually tell him. 

“And of course it would be a safer life,” Eddie said, peeling apart his chopsticks -- the waitress was approaching with his plate of orange chicken. It was hard to truly ever feel _full_ these days, but food really did seem more flavorful, stronger in scent, every morsel tastier. 

“Well, there’s that. I’m just saying, it might be a change that wouldn’t compromise your morals in any way.”

Of course she didn’t understand just how protected Eddie was -- she’d only had a little taste of what Venom had to offer -- and it was hard to explain it to a friend who truly worried, someone who cared about your safety. But it seemed hard to believe that anything could really pose a physical threat to them at this point. Still, Eddie let himself indulge in the idea, some kind of offshoot of the Brock Report in which the people who really deserved the spotlight were featured instead of celebrity chefs. “It’s not a bad idea,” he said. “Maybe I could make it some kind of monthly thing.”

“And work your way into do it full-time? You have staff now who could do the other stories, like this whole tiger thing…”

“That’s true, but Anne, you’ve got to understand. They don’t have partners like I do. I wouldn’t want to put them in harm’s way.”

Anne gave him a smile that was more sad than anything else, picking up a piece of beef with her chopsticks but not lifting it to her mouth just yet. “You really do think about that all the time unless it’s yourself, huh?”

“I have my priorities, Anne. And so does Venom.”

She held his gaze for a moment, thinking about what he was saying, then finally ate the bite she had been holding onto. “Quite the job it must be, keeping you out of harm’s way.”

“You know better than anybody. There’s a reason you retired from the gig.”

That made them both laugh. 

“Anyway. I hope you both know that it matters, you know,” Anne continued. “Staying -- alive. As silly as that sounds. And also just not pushing yourselves to the absolute limit.”

Venom gave a sort of movement deep down that reminded Eddie of when the cat used to roll onto his back to show his tummy. You might get bitten if you went as far as to actually touch it, but the message was apparent. Approval. Venom had a healthy dose of respect for Anne, and it wasn’t uncommon for it to take her side over his when he and Anne disagreed about something. Getting credit from her in return was exactly the sort of thing Venom liked.

“And you know what?” she added. “You’re doing a good job.” 

Eddie couldn’t explain why, but he knew this was addressed towards Venom, not him, and Venom knew it too. A tiny tendril of darkness, no thicker than a pencil, branched out across the table, between the teapot and the teacup, and patted Anne’s arm with a surprising degree of sweetness. This wasn’t common behavior for the symbiote, and Anne seemed to appreciate it properly.

“Oh god, you’re really going to make me tear up, now? You’re awful. The actual worst.” She sniffed, accepting the touch for a nice long moment before returning to her lo mein. While she was looking away, the tendril snatched a bite of beef off her plate and dragged it away so Eddie could sneak it. 

After that, the conversation shifted. Anne told a few funny stories from the hospital that Dan had told her. As always, she insisted on paying the check, told him he could pay next time. She always said that, too. In a world full of cruel and evil things, it was nice to know that there were still people like her. 

_So you must not disappoint her,_ Venom said once they had left the restaurant and were on the motorcycle, heading home. _You must at least think about it._

It was too loud to respond, but Eddie held the thought close, where Venom could find it. _All right, yeah. I’ll think about it._

* * *

Suz hosted Eddie at her own home until a sufficient cover of darkness fell and he could hop the Jurassic Park-tall chain-link fence that the neighbor, a Mr. Morton, had erected to keep all of his creatures from wandering. She stood with her hands on her hips, watching him go over with a simian ease. “Wow. Never did see anybody do that kind of thing in real life, just in the movies.”

“I’ve had plenty of practice,” he answered, dusting off his hands on his jeans once he landed on the other side. Which was true -- he was no stranger to scaling whatever walls or fences he needed to in order to get where he was going. But now, with Venom pitching in, it was effortless. “Basically, all I’m doing right now is gathering evidence. Not in a courtroom kind of way, that’s not going to hold up. But I want people to see what’s actually happening. And of course I’ll be sure to get the right people in to help before I break it publicly. Nothing is going to change tonight.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“I mean, you told me this was a guy who would shoot any of the tigers who try to escape. You said it yourself. Suppose the cops or animal control come knocking because I place some dumbass hysterical call after getting all of my photos, you think he’ll have any scruples if it means his own ass is out of prison?”

Suz nodded. “Right. Exactly. I don’t want any of them getting hurt. That’s not -- that’s not what I reached out to you for. I know you know this, I know I’ve already said it a million time, but I just want to reiterate…”

“Suz, listen to me. You’ve got my personal promise that none of them are going to get hurt.”

It seemed good enough for her and she nodded, watching him with her hands on her hips, looking for all the world like a mother hen. “All right. I’ll head back up to the house soon. Come back and I’ll make sure you’re fed before you head back.” She didn’t move, though, clearly wasn’t going to until he was out of sight. 

Eddie set off down through the thickets of bamboo and low brush that had been planted near the fence to try and obstruct visibility, knowing that the amount of noise he was making was probably not doing anything to reassure Suz. Well, there was just no helping that. Nothing had leapt out of the bushes to devour him... yet. 

It took a long while of walking just to come within eyeshot of the house where Suz’s neighbor lived. A few lights were on there, which Eddie had expected. It would have been too good to be true if the guy had been out, though there was a certain level of reassurance actually knowing where he was. There wasn’t a single sound except for the slight rustle of twigs beneath their feet and the insects that rang out faintly through the night.

“You’ll let me know if you sense anything, right, buddy?”

_I will let you know._

“That’s my Venom.”

They were silent for a long time, walking, trying to pick out the best path forward. The quarter moon shone out over the property, throwing odd shadows over everything and making Eddie jump a lot more than he liked -- a tiger could be hiding anywhere, couldn’t it? That was the whole point of tigers, that they would lie in wait and never be seen until the moment that it was too late. For the very first time since Eddie had embarked on this investigation, he felt a ripple of anxiety move through him at the idea of some giant animal sneaking up on them and breaking their neck.

Then the symbiote spoke again.

_Anne is right. You have not thought about it yet like you promised me you would, but that doesn’t mean she is not right._

“We’re doing this again, are we?” Eddie gave a nervous laugh. 

_About what you could do for your job. I can sense how fearful you are right now, Eddie. Waiting for creatures in the dark. You place yourself in these stressful situations..._

It would be so easy to argue, but what good would that do? Venom knew his heart like no one, like nothing else ever could. “Yeah,” he agreed, his voice low and on the edge of sullen. “Look, we’re not gonna make this particular stressful situation into an extended project, all right? We’re going in, getting our pictures for the story, and getting out. I’m not planning on spending more than, I dunno. Ten minutes? Ten minutes getting photos, then we get back over that fence and back to Suz’s, and then, then I swear to God I will seriously consider what Anne said.”

_You are in too deep now to leave, you think._

“What, with this tiger thing? You’re goddamn right I am. But we’ll be done soon.”

Venom was quiet again for another long moment and then added: _I_ am _excited to see the tigers._

“I know, buddy. I’m sure they’ll be worth the wait. You still listening for them?”

_I will tell you when it happens._

Another chain-link fence now rose up in front of them, a little bit taller than the first one they had scaled. This must be the inner area of the property where the animals could roam freely -- any that somehow made it under this one, or that slipped out when the gate was open, would be the ones marked for doom. They climbed this one too, and in here the plant life grew even more thickly. More places for the tigers to hide.

“Let’s keep going,” Eddie said, as if Venom was going to stop him now.

Every now and then, Eddie would do something that made no sense and that he _knew_ made no sense and he knew he should just wait a second and not do it, but some kind of base Eddie-instinct just sort of took over and he did that thing. Such was the case now, because his phone was ringing, thank god he didn’t have any actual ringtone but it was vibrating hard and loud and it was an unknown number, and there was no reason at all to pick up at a time like this, but--

“Yeah? Hello? Sorry, hello?”

The voice on the other end was wildly chipper. 

“Hi, yes, Mr. Eddie Brock?”

“That’s me. Uh.” Eddie lowered his voice, suddenly realizing how loud he was being. 

_It’s like you want the tigers to come and devour you,_ Venom noted, and Eddie pawed at the air to shush him.

“Mr. Brock, this is Kevin Anderson from Anderson & Lee Chocolatiers. How are you this evening?”

“Uh, yes. Fine, thanks--” Eddie glanced over his shoulder, still not quite comprehending why he was actually on this call. He stepped back until he was leaning against a half-rotted tree, surrounded by a skirt of fallen branches, peering up at the healthy segment of the tree that still rose above him -- no, the limbs were too weak to support anything bigger than a squirrel. “Can I help you, or--?”

“I won’t take up too much of your time, Mr. Brock. Eddie?”

“Yeah, sure, you can call me whatever--yeah?”

“Well, I just wanted to let you know that your business card was the one that we drew from the raffle box at Calm Mind Cafe earlier today, so you’ll be able to pick up the grand prize anytime you’re available.”

“Oh? Okay, yeah.” The words were hardly registering, but he could tell that the person on the phone was telling him something good, so he tried to force his voice into something that approached cheer. “That’s great. Yeah! That’s great. Awesome.”

_Eddie._ Venom sounded agitated, and he couldn’t tell if it was because they were in danger or because the thought of that much free chocolate had it in paroxysms. Either option seemed wholly possible.

“Do you have the address to our shop? I can give it to you now if you--”

“Oh, let me stop you there -- I can Google it, but thanks, wow, I appreciate you letting me know. Later this week, how about-- I’ll get it then.”

“All right, we’re looking forward to seeing y--”

 

Eddie had already hung up. Breathed in, out. Everything was silent, perfectly silent. Venom made no attempt to speak, though it might have been because it was listening hard for something, like a bird dog that had gone stock-still to point in the direction of a scent. So for a moment, anyway, Eddie allowed himself to give a little laugh after a few beats of nothing happening, slumping back against the tree so little pieces of bark sloughed off, falling at his feet. “You hear that, bud? We won the raffle. Sometimes this arbitrary world we live in ain’t so bad, huh?”

_Eddie!_

Before he even had time to realize what was happening, Venom had swallowed him up, and they were on the move, dodging away from the tree and rolling down a slight embankment as one of the captive tigers pounced, coming, truly out of nowhere, making itself known only when it was practically on top of them. It snarled so low that Eddie could feel it in their _gut_ , like he could hear it in his soul itself.

_Don’t hurt it!_ Eddie immediately said, and Venom resisted the urge to lash out at it, watched it closely instead. Still crouched down, both of them, both waiting for the other to move. The tiger’s eyes were burning gold, and it stood transfixed, teeth showing, clearly alarmed by the threat that the symbiote posed. _Hey, Venom, remember, we’re not gonna hurt it, okay? We promised Suz. It’s just scared. Someone it doesn’t know is scaring it._

“You made an enormous mistake in answering that phone call, Eddie. Look at this tiger. It will harm us if it gets the chance.” 

_Because it’s scared, okay? We’re stronger than it is. You and I both know that, come on._

The tiger braced itself, flattening its ears, letting out another low snarl. But it didn’t move forward, at least not yet, and the standoff between it and Eddie and Venom held out for a few more excruciating moments.

“It is beautiful,” Venom finally declared, and Eddie couldn’t help but let out a weak, adrenaline-shaky laugh.

_Yeah, for real! Look how beautiful it is. And it’s stuck here, in this prison, essentially. This isn’t where it’s supposed to live._

“Do you trust me, Eddie?”

_With all my heart. As long as you promise not to hurt it._

“Yes. I promise.”

And then the darkness lashed out like a bolt of lightning, away from Eddie and towards the tiger, which reacted instantly, its hair-trigger tripped, and it was jumping at Eddie but the darkness was encompassing it and then it was landing and Eddie had instinctively curled himself up like a pillbug, eyes squeezed shut-- it landed, right above him, but not tackling him, not pouncing on him, just standing -- almost preening….

Eddie opened his eyes and there above him, poised and entirely too pleased with itself, was Venom, fully possessing the tiger -- instead of soft, lush striped fur, it was covered in wet black goo, but molded into the shape of a tiger, its eyes blank-white and enormous, its teeth, its mouth, its tongue all fully that of Venom’s. It wasn’t just shining in the moonlight, it _glowed_.

“Mother of god,” Eddie squeaked. “That’s fuckin’ unreal.” 

The symbiote-tiger back up a few steps so Eddie could sit up, rub the dirt off the back of his head. “You look amazing,” he added, reaching his hand out so he could touch the tiger’s head. Either Venom was accessing the tiger’s brain fully or it had really been paying attention when they watched those tiger videos, because it immediately reacted the way any cat might--bumped into Eddie’s hand with its enormous snout, rubbing close for more pets. Eddie had to laugh at that. No matter what form Venom took, it always seemed to want that same kind of affection from Eddie, that same level of touch.

“Oh, that’s too cute. Look at you.I know I made you promise to not leave me for one of these but I may have to rethink that.”

Another sound made them both freeze -- but this was no secretive hunter that knew how to move silently, that was for sure. Rustling, rustling, then a tiny bleat of sound that made Eddie think of a lamb or a goat kid at first. Food for the tigers? But no, here it came, a tiger cub no bigger than a throw pillow, crying out. 

“Jesus, Venom, you’re its mom!”

The tiger’s mother-of-pearl eyes narrowed in a way that suggested Venom had not a single fucking clue what that meant. Eddie cleared his throat, started over. “The tiger you’re in right now is protecting her cub. And that’s the cub. That tiger is the, you know. Mama tiger.”

Still bawling, the little cub stumbled forward, not seeming sure if the now-possessed creature that looked completely different was actually its mother. “Do they abandon their babies if you touch them?” Eddie asked.

Venom gave a growl that Eddie knew meant _how would I know?_

He made sure to get a few good shots on his phone of the baby tiger that was calling out again and again -- it seemed healthy, from what he could see, though of course he wasn’t qualified to make any kind of veterinary call. Still. Roly-poly, noisy, no marks on it that looked like signs of injury or abuse. Suz would be glad to know that, at least. 

“Ready to go looking for more?”

Eddie scooped up the cub like it was no more than a teddy bear. It seemed, unfortunately, used to human handling, and though it squirmed a bit in his grasp, it didn’t seem to be in a particularly big hurry to get away from him. It rolled back and kicked at his arm with its back legs, just like his cat used to when he tried to carry him out of the bedroom.

“God, you’re cute too. Little critter.” The cub licked his hand, like it knew it had a reputation to maintain now.

Venom trotted on ahead, and as they moved closer to the house where the neighbor Morton lived, Eddie spied more tigers, mostly cubs or half-grown teenagers. Somehow he managed to keep his hold on the cub while pulling out his phone and grabbing a few more pictures. The other tigers didn’t seem to be keenly aware of their presence, at least not to the point of getting aggressive like the first tiger they had encountered had been, but it seemed like a wind had blown in their direction carrying their scent. Tails twitched. Eyes started out keenly into the dark. They were waiting for something, even if they didn’t know what it was.

“That’s way too many for this space, I’m pretty sure,” he murmured. There had to be a half-dozen, at least. 

The back porch light suddenly flicked on, and although it was too far away to actually illuminate Eddie and Venom, it was a bad sign indeed. “He’s gonna come out,” Eddie whispered, and Venom turned, tail swishing. “We’ve got what we need, bud. Let’s get back to Suz’s.”

Sure enough, a figure made his way out of the house, visible only as a silhouette, but that was all Eddie needed to book it on out of there. Back the way they came, back to the first of the two fences. God, but Venom looked incredible in this form, even more like an alien than Eddie had ever seen, even more than its formless parasite shape. Eddie had to admire how strange and lithe and powerful it looked as it walked silently just ahead, even as a little touch of jealousy gnawed at him -- the one that always came out when Venom hopped to another host for just a bit. No helping that. It was worth seeing something so bizarre and lovely, being separated for a time.

“All right, little guy,” Eddie told the cub, once they were close enough to the fence for Eddie to rattle it. “We’re heading home. Hopefully soon, you will be too.”

Venom hopped back into Eddie and swung them up over the fence fast enough that the mother tiger didn’t have time to react -- she was too concerned with locating her cub. By the time they were on the other side, the mother tiger was on guard again, but not quite as wary as before. “See. We’re all fine. We made it,” Eddie said, hugging his arms around himself in a way that comforted them both. 

_She was going to strike, Eddie._

“Yeah, I know. You saved me, though.” Eddie smiled. “The way you always do.”

As always, Venom wasn’t too sure what to do about receiving direct praise, even though he ought to be used to it by now. _I suppose I have to. You are my host._

“You can do better than that.”

Venom roiled within him, pleased in a way that was not easy to articulate. It felt almost like the way it felt to go over a big dip in a road during a car ride, a floating flutter. _And also I love you._

“Oh, see, that’s what I was hoping to hear.”

They only looked back once, and the mother tiger was still sitting by the fence, grooming the cub with long languid licks, and there was no sign of Morton, and none of the tigers had been harmed, and yes, this did feel like a high note to pause on, to take a break from such a high-stress life. Suz would be waiting back at her house with a turkey sandwich and a sigh of relief when she saw him return unharmed, and that, just for a moment, felt like the greatest reward in the world.

* * *

Apparently, all of that cutesy advertising in places like Calm Mind Cafe had worked like a charm. The line at Anderson & Lee Chocolatiers was unbelievable, and Eddie had to admit that he’d want to come back again and again, if only to smell the air. 

“Did you hear about that guy with all those tigers? What a crazy story.”

The two young women ahead of him in line were discussing the very story that Eddie had put out the day before. This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, someone not realizing that Eddie himself was around while they talked about something they had seen on the Brock Report. It made him feel like a true fly on the wall, and he thought he’d probably never get over it. 

“Yeah, when the cops went in they said there were sixteen of them on the property. Sixteen!”

“Can you believe that guy didn’t get his arm bitten off?” The woman scoffed, adjusting her sunglasses. “You hear about things like that all of the time. People trying to deal with animals that they don’t have the first clue about caring for.”

“At least the tigers are going to a reputable place, thank god…”

“Did you see the pictures of that little baby cub? Poor thing, it can’t ever go back to the wild, I bet.”

“I’m sure they’ll make sure it gets taken care of. There are places they can rehabilitate it...”

“I wonder how many other people are doing things like this?”

“It’s not illegal outside of California, I knew this guy on the east coast who…”

The conversation dissolved as they approached the counter to place their order, and Venom murmured into Eddie’s mind:

_You are proud of the work that you do. And you should be. Your name is known and you are respected._

Wasn’t that a climb, after the particularly painful rock bottom he had fallen down into all that time ago? Eddie didn’t have his Bluetooth earpiece with him right now, so he wasn’t as inclined to respond out loud, but Venom could feel how he warmed with happiness upon hearing it. It was so distracting that Eddie almost blanked out when his turn at the counter came.

“Can I help you?” asked the clerk, a small young woman with two blonde braids hanging down on either side of her face. 

Eddie blinked himself back to reality and turned on his most disarming smile, the kind that worked wonders when he was showered and properly dressed but made people turn tail when he was exhausted or wasted. “Yeah, hi, I actually won that raffle you guys had a couple of days ago. I said I would be in to get it this week, so, you know, here I am…”

“Oh!” The clerk glanced back behind her, getting someone’s attention. “Mr. Lee? The winner says he’s here.”

Eddie was expecting to see a lot of chocolate, but what Mr. Lee emerged from the back with was absolutely unreal. Six boxes wrapped in a blinding-shiny silver foil, each one smaller than the one below it, so that they formed a shape like a child’s block tower, tied together with fluffy green ribbon. The whole shebang was at least three feet in height, and the people in line and the people standing near the walls choosing truffles and hot chocolate tins were staring, murmuring with approval and jealousy. “Mr. Brock, if you would be kind enough to show some ID, you can leave with all of this right now…”

It was worth the inordinate amount of time it took fishing around in his wallet to finally dredge up his driver’s license -- Christ, he really needed to take some time to organize all of this one of these days -- to get hold of all of those boxes. By this point, the symbiote was practically vibrating, like a caffeine rush with a voice bouncing around inside him.

_Everyone is looking at us_ Venom told him, not sounding the least bit put out by it. _But they will not get to eat any of this! Only us._

It was worth hauling all of it into the cab, too -- this wasn’t a job for a motorcycle, even Eddie wasn’t stupid enough to try that. Well. Not today, at least. And worth the comments of the cabbie, too. He seemed to have invented some kind of universe for Eddie in which he was giving all of that to a girlfriend or wife, without ever actually asking Eddie if that was really the case. “She’s gonna be a happy lady, isn’t she? You know what they say, don’t you? Happy wife, happy life. And you’re going to have a happy life now, my friend.”

Venom let the tiniest tendril wrap around Eddie’s finger as they rode, and Eddie curled his finger in in acknowledgement. “Well. You’ve got me there. Happy life, that’s right.”

Worth carrying up all those flights of stairs, too. At last, they had the tower sitting on the kitchen table and Eddie was toying with the ribbon that held it all together, pulling gently enough that it wouldn’t all open up. All this while, Venom had been nattering at him nonstop, clearly not caring if it was a distraction to Eddie as he made his way to his door. 

_This is all for us! All ours! You must open it as soon as you can!_

“So you’re forgiving me for taking that phone call back at the tiger place, right? Because if I hadn’t, who knows.” Eddie grinned. Finally, they were back in true privacy, safe to enjoy their prize. Eddie had sat them down at the kitchen table and placed the boxes like an enormous trophy directly in front of them. “Maybe they’d have given up and called someone else instead and then where would we be? Not with all of this bounty.”

_Yes. You are forgiven._ Venom slithered out from Eddie just a little bit, materializing some darkness over Eddie’s hand in an approximation of holding it. It felt cool and pleasant, like a wet washcloth on a feverish forehead. _I shouldn’t have told you that you were stupid to answer the phone call that you got. Imagine if we had not received all of this._

“I know, you’d be just heartbroken, and we’d be eating Hershey kisses in the bathtub again or something.” Eddie tugged on the ribbon again. “And we can’t have you feeling bad, can we?”

_You have a tone to your voice that I like, Eddie. Does the idea of all of this excite you?_

“Well, the idea of you being so excited excites me.” With a sudden yank, Eddie pulled the ribbon free, and Venom rippled through him like electricity, waiting for Eddie’s next move. “And between the tiger and this, you’ve had a lot of excitement over the past few days, haven’t you?”

_Yes. Though there is little in this world that is as exciting to me as playing with you._

“You’re gonna make me blush,” Eddie murmured, pulling the lid off the topmost box, the smallest one. This one was filled with white chocolates shaped like hearts, filled with raspberry and drizzled with dark chocolate stripes -- like a tiger, Eddie and Venom thought, right at the same exact moment. 

“You looked amazing.”

_What?_

“When you were that tiger.”

_You are not attracted to tigers, Eddie._ This statement came with the familiar feeling of someone scoffing in his head. But of course Venom couldn’t hide the fact that he was impressed, seeing himself reflected in Eddie’s memory -- seeing how much Eddie liked watching him in such a strange and ferocious form. 

“Hell of an observation, bud.”

_But you are attracted to me._ This, now, how smug it sounded. 

“Mm.” Venom was slithering just so below his belly, twisting and piling in on them in a way that suggested a lovely impatience. Eddie took a bite of the chocolate heart, and the heaviness and richness of the chocolate and raspberry was unspeakably delicious -- even more so when tasted through Venom’s hyper-sensitive mind. “You look good enough to eat, Ven, no matter what.”

_You would not eat me._

“Only allowed the other way around?”

Venom gave a little purr. _Today I will not eat you,_ came the tease. _Today, we will eat our prize together, and perhaps I will encourage you in other ways._

“Oh yeah?” Eddie finished the chocolate heart he was eating. “I like the sound of that, tiger.”

Venom began to surface through Eddie’s skin, trailing down Eddie’s skin. _Take another._

“Say please.”

_Take another,_ Venom commanded, stubborn. The tendrils of darkness were moving south, slipping under the waistband of Eddie’s jeans, and Eddie didn’t hesitate to unbutton them to give Venom better access. With his other hand, he reached back into the smallest box, slowly withdrawing another heart. 

_As nice as entrails._

“Even nicer,” Eddie murmured. 

_It is not shaped like the real heart, but it is sufficient._

“Hey, I didn’t even think of that,” Eddie responded. “Hearts for you to eat in a way I actually agree with.”

Venom was easing its way around the elastic of Eddie’s boxers now, determined to tease back with the same slowness that Eddie was eating. _More,_ it said, though Eddie wasn’t sure if it wanted to give or get more, but that didn’t matter at all, because both were going to happen, and the taste of the candy blazed sweet and hot in Eddie’s mouth as the tendrils gently tightened around his upper thighs, around his cock, Venom’s patience just barely restrained.

“Jesus, you are _really_ into this, Ven.”

_I want us to come._

“Oh, buddy, trust me, fuck, you are not going to have to wait too long for that.” Eddie exhaled hard, whining a little bit when his next bite of the chocolate heart was rewarded by another tiny bit of tightening, the pressure now approximating the feeling of a hand around him. 

_You push yourself hard,_ Venom answered, moving faster, pushing Eddie’s legs further apart for even better access. _You should let us do more things for pleasure._

“If it were up to you we’d be living totally hedonistically,” Eddie laughed, and then the laugh dissolved into a gasp because fuck, how could a handjob feel this good when there weren’t any hands involved? Getting off with Venom was like looking into one of those mirrors at a fancy-pants clothing store, Eddie’s pleasure reflected in Venom’s reflected in Eddie’s and so on and so forth into forever. The first time they’d -- fucked? Masturbated? They hadn’t slapped a label on it, but they’d definitely both felt good -- Eddie had nearly fainted, not used to the enormous echoing sensation of pleasure. Since then, he’d been able to get used to it, in a way, but not so used to it that it bored either of them. 

Eddie was about to reach forward to take another heart from the top box when Venom finally hit its limit and lost patience, wrapping and writhing around Eddie with complete abandoned, rough but not overly so, just -- needy! As if there was nothing on its mind besides getting them off right that moment, not even the next chocolate. 

“Fuck!”

Eddie braced himself with one foot on the kitchen floor, the other one braced against the leg of the table, his jeans and boxers stretched taut between them, half-off. Thank Christ the blinds were shut, lest the neighbors be treated to the sight of Eddie arched in his seat, overwhelmed by the black murk of Venom slithering over his lower half -- even without his penis visible, it was a sight that would require more explanation than he really felt like offering. No need to worry about any of that right now, though, no need to worry about anything, not when it all felt so good.

“I’m--”

Venom’s sudden snarl filled his entire body, bottom to top, every hair and cell and pore, and it was moments like this, even more than when Venom swallowed him up and took control, that he felt like they were one hundred percent the same being. 

And then they’d come, and the only sound was Eddie panting and the tick-tick of the kitchen clock, Venom silent now, sated. Eddie didn’t speak again for a long moment either, and then he laughed softly.

“Hedons. That’s what we are.”

Venom didn’t respond, just retreated back into Eddie’s skin, invisible but present, thick with satisfaction. 

“Not that there’s anything wrong with that.” 

_Nothing._

“You’re awfully good.”

_We do such wonderful things to each other._

A single beat of silence, and then: 

_More chocolate._ Another pause. _Please._

* * *

“I absolutely cannot believe you didn’t get your entire head bitten off,” Anne said as Dan handed his credit card to the ticket taker, asking for tickets to Nosferatu. A local theater was showing it as part of a vintage horror revival series, and they’d made plans to all go together as a double date, though of course they only needed seats for three. 

“Oh, come on. You knew I wouldn’t.”

“Dan, tell him,” Anne said. “Tell him I genuinely worried, because guess what? I don’t actually learn.”

“She thought I was going to see you in the emergency room holding your eyeball,” Dan confirmed, handing the freshly-printed tickets over. “Saw it happen with a guy who ran into a mountain lion on a hike. That was some nasty business there.”

“Well, I told her that I had help and that was true.”

They made their way to the lobby, which was filled with posters of all of the old-timey horror movies that would be shown over the next few weeks. Nosferatu had been chosen mostly because it worked with Dan’s schedule at the hospital, but Eddie was secretly glad -- it was the one he’d wanted to see most.

“You’ve got all of your eyeballs as far as I can tell,” Dan said mildly. “That’s all that matters, right? And you got the story, which I’m sure is what matters most to you. It was a damn good one, too.” Dan shook his head. “Those poor animals.”

“Anyway, Anne doesn’t have to worry about my eyes or anything else for the time being,” Eddie answered. “I’m going to take this whole restaurant writing thing for a test drive.”

Anne smiled, and Eddie went on. “I’m not _giving up_ the other stories, so, uh. Don’t get it in your head otherwise.” Eddie scratched his cheek, his bracelets rattling. “But anything that you and Ven both agree on, well. It’s hard to argue with.”

_Finally, you admit it,_ Venom piped in. 

The little theater was nearly full by the time they all sat down with their drinks and popcorn, and Venom was yet again buzzing with excitement, ready to see something strange and grotesque like a long-clawed vampire. (Eddie had familiarized him with the concept the night before, and Venom had liked the idea of something so powerful and frightening, even with, as Venom put it, such pitiful little teeth.) How lucky Eddie was, he thought, to have a partner that was always so full of wonder at the world it had landed in, even if it had to be taught not to respond to that world by devouring it. How lucky it was to live in a world full of good food and tigers, old movies and old friends. Once more, Venom wrapped a tendril around the fingers of Eddie’s hand in an intimation of holding it, and Eddie grew warm and content in a way that totally belied the eeriness of the movie they were about to watch. 

_One day you will long to go after the dangerous stories again, Eddie._

_One day, yeah. I know it’ll happen._ Eddie agreed. _But for right now, I’m all right._

The tendril gave a soft squeeze, and the lights went down in the theater, and for now all there was to fear was imaginary, something easy to laugh at when the story was over, conquered like a vampire in the sunshine.

**Author's Note:**

> What an enormous and fun project to be a part of! I cannot thank the fine folks who ran the Symbrock Big Bang like clockwork enough, and I can't thank my amazing partners Aura and starkickback enough either. Both of them made some incredible art for this story that seemed plucked straight from my own brain as I wrote. I hope y'all enjoy!
> 
> Here are the links to the art!  
> [Stakickback](https://starkickback.tumblr.com/post/184854319989/the-thrill-is-strong-but-not-so-sweet-this-is-a)  
> [Aura](https://happinessfordeeppeople.tumblr.com/post/184852415645/my-artwork-for-the-symbrock-big-bang-for-the)


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